Democrats will face headwinds in final push to confirm Biden judges

CNN — The first vote the lame-duck Senate will take as it returns Tuesday will be on a nominee for a Chicago federal court, kicking off Democrats’ uphill campaign to confirm as many of President Joe Biden’s picks for the judiciary as possible before losing power at the end of next month. While there may have been some outside talk of that in the election’s immediate aftermath, Democratic Vermont Sen. Peter Welch, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, called that “fantasy football discussions.” Maggie Jo Buchanan, the managing director of Demand Justice, which advocates for progressive judicial nominations, told CNN that the emphasis is on lower court judges, as she called on Democratic Senate leadership to work through the remaining weekends if need be. The White House official pointed to how Republican Texas Sen. John Cornyn on Saturday promised “no weekends, no breaks” to confirm Trump’s Cabinet once he took power, and the White House official encouraged Democrats to show that dedication to judges in Biden’s final stretch. “On a day you would normally process two nominees, why not process three?” A final sprint after 213 judges confirmed The Democratic judicial push has confirmed 213 Biden nominees to the federal bench so far and has broken records in terms of racial and professional diversity, even if Biden is still short of the 234 judges Trump put on the bench in his first term. “Senate Democrats are in a strong position regarding judicial confirmations as we approach the lame duck session given that we have a number of nominees on the floor ready for a vote,” said a spokesperson for Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin of Illinois.